I have ranted before about the shortfalls of budgeting and how budgeting encourages us to think of projects in terms of cost rather than in terms of value creation. This is particularly troubling for parts of the organisation known as Corporate (or Shared) Services. Corporate Services generally include areas such as Legal, Human Resources, Procurement and IT. These services are necessary for the smooth operation of the business, but unlike Operations, they are generally not considered to be income generating. As they aren’t directly involved in income generation, they are often seen by the rest of the business as a necessary evil where their cost (and often their involvement) needs to be minimised (for IT this challenge is often particularly acute because in many large organisations the Head of IT reports into the CFO).

The problem with this approach is by focusing on cost minimisation, organisations inadvertently also reduce value generation.

In the modern workplace, technology improvements have become an increasingly fertile ground for innovation but ‘innovation’ is often in direct conflict to the IT department’s primary objective of platform stability and security. Perhaps the simplest definition of innovation is ‘change that creates value’, but change both contradicts the goal of stability and also necessarily comes with attached risk, and risk is often viewed in conflict with the goal of security.

This perceived conflict has created a certain inertia in how IT departments operate that somewhat ironically results in more but different types of risk. Organisations might think they are reducing short-term operational risk by focusing on stability and security, but in doing so they are creating medium-term implementation risks (as change shifts from being small, relatively simple and continuous to large, relatively complex and sporadic) and longer-term strategic risks (as competitors identify and implement technology innovations at a faster rate).

An alternative is to re position IT (and perhaps all corporate services) as innovation catalysts. Rather than passively waiting for people to tell them what they need, IT could be proactively engaging with the business to find out what could be done better (and then working in partnership to make it happen). I often talk of IT as being Digital Champions but like many terms that have entered our collective lexicon, its familiarity has led to it losing some of its meaning. A Digital Champion is someone who keeps abreast of emerging technology opportunities and then champions its potential within the organisation. Championing something is unavoidably and unashamedly proactive. It requires constant engagement, education and ultimately a sense of (shared) service.

If this feels like a seismic shift, it doesn’t need to be. Like any change it is best if it’s started small. It should not be focused on investing in or developing new platforms and instead aim to unlock the latent potential in the platforms an organisation has already invested in. Perhaps the biggest change requires is a change of mindset. Like other Corporate functions, IT are often treated as second class citizens, and as a result many have come to believe it. But by giving the IT team the tools and training, and subsequently the belief that they can drive innovation and add ridiculous amounts of value to the organisation, we can change this perception.

At the end of the day, the best way for IT departments to change the perception that they’re more than a cost centre is to prove it. All they need to do is take the time to understand people’s challenges and then share the know how they already have. Person by person, team by team, department by department.

I’ll be hosting a two-day intensive program on 15-16 October in Sydney where we will take your champions through the process of identifying, investigating and delivering technology improvements with sustainable success. As a special offer, use the promo code INTENSIVE20 to avail of a 20% discount on the ticket price. Click here for tickets and further information on this insanely practical event.

https://www.simonwaller.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/IT-is-not-a-cost-centre.jpg400600Simonhttps://www.simonwaller.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/simonwaller-web-1-300x138.pngSimon2019-08-23 10:41:502019-08-29 15:52:51IT is not a cost centre

When it comes to getting technology projects approved in organisations, there is almost always a detailed process to follow. This process is designed to ensure that each project is rigorously assessed and the right projects get approved. But is it possible to have too much rigour?

The difference between making things and improving things
Most project assessment processes are designed for making new things. Project management methodologies such as PRINCE2 and PMBOK provide lengthy processes for identifying stakeholders, collecting business requirements, creating business cases, getting project approval, assembling the project team and planning the project…all before anything actually gets done. Now it’s not to say that these processes don’t have value, but for smaller ‘improvement projects’ they can also add unnecessary complexity and friction.

Rigour makes things rigid
Long convoluted approval processes that define projects to exacting requirements can in fact make projects unnecessarily rigid. Not only can excessive planning make us option-blind (unable to see previously unconsidered but potentially beneficial courses of action) research also suggests that increased planning is not necessarily correlated with greater value generation. There is a real risk that too much rigour means we’re developing worse outcomes, not better ones.

Rigour adds friction
The secret to promoting certain behaviours within an organisation is to decrease the friction associated with more preferable behaviours and increase the friction associated with less preferable ones. If we assume that organisations want to be more innovative, and that a simple definition of innovation is just ‘change that creates value’, then we need to decrease the friction associated with identifying and approving change initiatives. If we make it hard and time consuming for people to identify and implement improvements in how they work (or with the technology systems they use) then their most likely response to a new idea is ’stuff it’.

Rigour is often opaque
The process for getting a project approved is often unclear, and sometimes intentionally so. In fact, there are often vested interests in saying ’no’ and maintaining the status quo (for instance this might happen where the value of a project accrues to one part of the organisation, such as marketing or operations, but the cost of implementing and maintaining the project falls on a different part of the organisation, such as IT). The more complex the approval process and the more variables to consider, the less transparent the process becomes.

In praise of minimum rigour
If we were to apply the Pareto principle, we could estimate that 80% of the risk of a project can be removed by applying just 20% of the rigour. What’s more, reducing the amount of effort (and ‘sunk costs’) that go into the assessment process means that even after a project has been approved, we are less likely to feel beholden to it if conditions or information changes. So what exactly does minimum rigour look like? Well this might change from one organisation to another but there are certain characteristics you might look for

It fits on a page – The plan on a page approach is common in improvement methodologies such as Lean Manufacturing. I’ve seen the ‘plan on a page’ concept extended to two sides of an A3 piece of paper but my belief is that a good plan can be presented on one side of an A4 page.

It answers the big questions – There should be some clear questions that need to be answered as to why the project is being done (including a clear value proposition), how the outcome is going to be achieved, and what is going to happen.

Anyone can use it – As soon as you require a Business Analyst or some other specialist person to complete the project plan, you have added unnecessary friction. The process should be available to everyone and the process for getting to ‘Yes’ should be quite clear.

The Digital Champions Framework teaches an approach to minimum rigour for IT improvement projects based on just nine questions. If you’d like to learn the approach and understand how it can be applied check out our upcoming two-day intensive training programs in Perth, Melbourne and Sydney.*

*Up until the 30th June you can also use the promo code EOFY20 to get a 20% discount on DCC event tickets.

What is your organisation’s approach to identifying technology opportunities? One common approach is some form of suggestion box. Just pop your idea (somewhat ironically) onto a piece of paper and drop it in the box. At some later undefined date, an ‘expert’ will assess the idea and determine whether it is valid (often with little understanding of the person or job that it relates to) and affordable (often including an assessment of cost but rarely an assessment of value).

Then, assuming it meets the required criteria it will then be added to the backlog of other projects that the under-staffed IT team is currently trying to wade through. When it finally gets to the front of the queue, it will then take another indeterminate amount of time to write and approve a requirements document and scope of work which is the precursor to getting something done.

Unfortunately this approach is slow, opaque and full of friction. This in turn results in people not bothering to use it, even if they have genuinely good and easy to implement opportunities. In fact, the friction of the suggestion box method is a major contributor to another method, commonly referred to as ‘shadow IT’.

Shadow IT is when technology products are procured and deployed without the knowledge of the IT department. It involves individuals identifying a problem themselves and then playing around with a few different apps to see if one can help fix it. After signing up for half a dozen free trials and testing each of the apps with potentially sensitive corporate data, they then select their preferred solution, enter in their credit card details and the work is done…unless of course they didn’t test their requirements completely and they then find out the app didn’t work as they hoped.

Clearly, this approach also has its shortcomings. Not only is there no real consideration for information security, there is also a complete lack of rigour. These issues mean that most organisations don’t generally condone the shadow IT approach.

So what sits between the suggestion box and shadow IT? Could we add a little rigour and process to the shadow IT approach or potentially improve the speed, transparency and effectiveness of the suggestion box? Could we perhaps bring those two things together and get the best of both worlds?

The Digital Champions Framework provides a way for your citizen experts (those people in your organisation who are digitally savvy but sit outside the IT team) to identify, investigate and deliver simple yet valuable technology improvements. Not only does the development of internal digital champions facilitate the delivery of technology improvements without unnecessary burden on already stretched IT resources, it also creates ‘bottom up’ support for larger digital transformation projects.

To find out more about the Digital Champions Framework my Digital Champions Club is running a series of two-day intensives in Perth, Melbourne and Sydney. I will also be running an introductory breakfast event in Sydney at the end of this month where you can find out more about the framework and how to implement it successfully.

*Up until the 30th June you can also use the promo code EOFY20 to get a 20% discount on tickets.

https://www.simonwaller.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/DCC_6x4.png400600Simonhttps://www.simonwaller.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/simonwaller-web-1-300x138.pngSimon2019-05-21 15:28:172019-05-29 13:56:49Between the suggestion box and shadow IT

The beginning of January is a magical time of year. It’s the one time where we get to look forward to all the possibility and not have to deal with any of the failures. If you’re anything like me your social media feeds and email inbox will have been flooded with tips on how to achieve your goals to “Make [insert year] the best year ever”. More than any other month of the year, January is a time of immense optimism.

So to help you plan better for 2019 I’m not going to provide some rah rah advice on how to achieve your goals, but rather some practical advice on how to ensure that when you fail to achieve your goals or complete your projects that at least you do it well.

1. Make your failures smallSmall failures are much more palatable than big ones. Using the analogy of a gym membership, it makes more sense to not use a one month gym membership than a 12 month one. Smaller projects (and shorter memberships) might be relatively more expensive but until you know you can achieve your goals it makes sense to make small bets first.

2. Make your failures uniqueThere is no point failing for exactly the same reasons as everyone else. Spend a little time finding out why other people have failed on similar projects and then build in contingencies for this from the beginning. This will not completely eliminate the risk of failure, but at least you won’t fail for reasons that could have been easily avoided.

3. Fail earlyIf you’re going to fail then ideally you want to fail before you’ve made a substantial investment of time, money and resources. To achieve this you need to try and identify the unknowns of your project and likely failure points so you can test them as quickly as possible. Once again, this won’t stop you failing but it will greatly reduce the financial, emotional or chronological cost of doing so.

4. Fail oftenI’m not suggesting that you actively seek out failure but rather you should regularly put yourself in a position where failure is an option. In some ways failure is a game of odds: the more projects you start, the more improvements you attempt to make, the more likely it is that you will encounter failure. So rather than try and avoid failure all together, see that it’s an unavoidable outcome of creating valuable change.

All the best for your failures in 2019. May they be your best failures yet!

…and if some of the projects you’re looking to deliver this year are technology related, and you’re interested in doing them more successfully (and perhaps even failing a few of them really well) we are currently recruiting new members for the Digital Champions Club. The Digital Champions Club is a digital transformation program for small and medium sized organisations that develops the internal experts you need to deliver value adding technology projects. If you’d like to find out more about the program or to get some free advice on how to avoid projects failing, get in touch to book a free 25-minute consultation with me.

https://www.simonwaller.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Are-you-ready-to-fail-in-2019.png400600Simonhttps://www.simonwaller.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/simonwaller-web-1-300x138.pngSimon2019-01-15 09:42:472019-03-06 14:36:43Are you ready to fail in 2019?

On the weekend I took my seven and ten year old girls to their first ever music festival. Now, anyone who has regularly attended music festivals such as (the now defunct) Big Day Out, Falls Festival or even more adult orientated events such as A Day on the Green may question whether taking children to a music festival is such a good idea. Mainly because when adults attend music festivals, most of them or many of them end up acting like kids…and when I say this I mean it in the worst possible way.

At their worst, kids act selfishly and without any real sense of responsibility. They lack the awareness to understand what’s going on around them and fail to acknowledge the impact their actions are having on those around them. Fuelled by music, alcohol (and other illicit substances) and without social norms of their day-to-day environment to constrain them. This is how many adults behave at music festivals.

But this was a very different type of music festival. Created by the founder of Falls Festival, The Lost Lands has been built from the ground up as a festival for families. There were still big name music acts but these were interspersed with performances and other activities for kids. There were comedy shows, acrobatic performances, dance classes, a movie night and even a giant ferris wheel. Not only did the festival create an incredibly safe space for children, it also encouraged many of the adults to act more like kids…and this time I mean it in the best way possible.

At their best, kids are caring, trusting and generous. They aren’t hampered by cynicism or past baggage. Instead, they are filled with wonder, open to learning and want to explore and try new things. And this was how I saw every single adult behaving at The Lost Lands. They spent their time moving between the acts that they already knew about and the performances that interested their children. They tested their skills on games made out of old bicycle parts, got their face painted. At the same time the adults acted more like adults than at an 18+ event: they were thoughtful, helpful and incredibly respectful of giving others around them, especially children, space to dance and enjoy themselves.

There is a quote by Dennis Bakke that goes “If you treat people like adults they will act like adults, but if you treat them like children they will act like children.” But what if you want them to act like both? What if you want adults to act with the maturity of adults but with the openness and wonder of children?

And at this point we’re going to segue to from how organisers plan music festivals to how organisations approach technology (I’m approaching this from the perspective of technology change because that’s what I do, but I think this analogy is relevant to many facets of organisational life).

The traditional approach to IT was to treat people like children…and when I say this I mean it in the worst possible way. They weren’t to be trusted, couldn’t make decisions for themselves and just needed to do what they were told and eat whatever was put in front of them. Of course they generally just pushed their technology around the plate with a fork, they became stubborn about trying new things even if it was ‘good for them’. Some rebelled, started sneakily using new technology without asking permission, or if things got really bad they chucked a tantrum and left the organisation. Treating them like kids got them to act like kids at their worst.

But what if we could get people to act like kids at their best? To be inquisitive about new technology and new ideas, to play and explore, to share and collaborate with their friends in a thoughtful, caring and respectful way? How could we get our end users to see the wonder and get genuinely excited about technological change and create a culture that celebrates learning and growth?

Much has been written about the difference between the leading and the laggard organisations when it comes to technology. But I believe even these organisations could learn something from The Lost Lands. And although the following list is not exhaustive, it provides some ideas as to how we can encourage people to better understand the role technology plays in our work and our lives by getting lost in the wonder of technology for a while.

Make it fun – If technology always involves change, effort or more work then it will always be challenging to get engagement.

Provide enough time – People are busy. We need to give the gift of time if we want people to explore new ideas and understand their application.

Provide a safe space – We don’t need to celebrate failure so much as acknowledging that failure is a necessary part of innovation. If we want people to innovate we need to provide a safe space, away from customer and client facing work, to test and potentially fail in.

Give guidance – Make sure there are always people around who can provide encouragement, direction, advice and support.

Limit the rules – Not only do rules limit everyone to the standard set by the lowest common denominator, they imply a lack of trust and discourage a critical understanding of positive and negative behaviours.

Encourage diversity (in everything) – A diversity of technology, people and ideas means that you will be be exposed to new ideas, just by standing still.

Be full of surprises – Constantly give people a reason to wonder (and wander)

https://www.simonwaller.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/The-Lost-Lands.jpg400600Simonhttps://www.simonwaller.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/simonwaller-web-1-300x138.pngSimon2018-11-12 11:25:512018-11-12 16:48:22How to get adults to act like kids (in the best possible way)

A few weeks back we launched the inaugural scholarships for the Digital Champions Club and now there is just a little over 48 hours before applications close. The scholarships are for not-for-profit and for-purpose organisations who want to access the support, accountability and a community of like minded organisations to help them implement their technology projects.

To spread the word and help make sure that this opportunity finds the right organisations we have been playing a game called #passiton. All that we ask is that you pass on this message to three people that you think might benefit from being a part of the Digital Champions Club. With so little time left this is perhaps our last opportunity to get the word out there. So if you haven’t already done so, please take moment to think about the charities, causes and other initiatives you would like to succeed and pass this along.

I had an awkward moment with a close friend recently. I’ve known Harsha for more than a decade and she’s someone I’ve leaned on every now and then for marketing advice around the various programs I offer. The awkward moment arose because, after five years of telling Harsha about the Digital Champions Club, she still had to ask me what it was exactly that I do.

At the time I found it quite disheartening, that someone who is clearly switched on, someone who genuinely cares about me and what I do, someone who I’ve spent hours talking to about my work still didn’t have any real clarity about what the Digital Champions Club is or why it exists.

My initial response was a sense of frustration — initially directed outwards at Harsha’s failure to listen, and then directed inwards at my own inability to clearly articulate my proposition. So why is it that we struggle to convey things clearly?

I think firstly it’s because it’s hard to get out of our own heads. What I mean by this is it’s hard to explain things without the context of a whole bunch of other stuff that may also need explaining but that you aren’t aware enough to realise. As a result, the explanations which sound whole and well rounded to us are hollow and incomplete to others.

Second, I think the packaging can get in the way of the product. Our desire to create things that are unique, memorable and exciting brings us to use language that is unnecessarily complex and difficult to follow. Unless it’s meant to be a genuine surprise, perhaps it’s best that we dispense with some of the gift wrapping.

Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, I feel like a bit of a dick talking about myself. Which means I generally don’t do it, and therefore when I do it’s all a little off the cuff and just kind of sounds a bit awkward, which in turn makes me feel like a bit of a dick…and the cycle continues.

So Harsha set me a challenge: articulate the Digital Champions Club in a way that people could actually understand and then share it with all the other people who, like her, are currently unsure of what it is I do.

I’ve been procrastinating on this for a couple of weeks because, apart from the dislike of talking about myself, it feels a little awkward to be openly broadcasting my inherent uncertainty and lack of clarity in a world where ‘experts’ are meant to have endless reserves of both.

Yet perhaps in a small way this is a form of therapy, so Harsha, after hours of struggle and refinement here it goes….

I support small and medium-sized organisations who are struggling to build momentum in the delivery of their technology projects (sometimes referred to as digital transformation). I do this through a combination of monthly coaching (to provide support and accountability), one day workshops (for deep learning) and peer-to-peer sharing (to reduce risk). Collectively, these are delivered as a technology-focused, continuous improvement program called the Digital Champions Club.

So how did I do? No, honestly, I’d genuinely like to know…and it really does still sound hollow and incomplete (or even if it doesn’t) feel free to download it my latest white paper “When Technology Fails to Deliver” which explains a whole bunch of the other stuff that goes around in my head.

P.S. I’ve already been back into LinkedIn to edit this…twice.

https://www.simonwaller.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/What-is-it-that-I-do_6x4.png400600Simonhttps://www.simonwaller.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/simonwaller-web-1-300x138.pngSimon2018-09-24 15:41:282018-09-25 16:39:24The challenge of explaining what you do

In 2015 Chapman University in the United States undertook researchers to find out what Americans feared. 1,500 participants ranked 88 different items on a scale of one (not afraid) to four (very afraid). So, what did they find?

​It turns out people (or American people at least) are more afraid of technology than they are of death.​​Of the top five fears in the survey, three were technology related. Cyberterrorism came in at number two, corporate tracking of personal data came in at number three and Government tracking of personal data came in at number five. In fact, robots replacing the workforce (25), trusting artificial intelligence to do work (34), robots (38) and artificial intelligence (40) all ranked above ‘death’ which didn’t make an appearance until position 43.

​So why are so many people more scared of technology than they are of death?

​In general, the things we fear have three common characteristics:

​Firstly, the outcomes are undesirable. People who suffer from acrophobia, or a fear of heights, don’t fear heights per se, they fear what would happen if they were to fall. We are more likely to fear things where the outcome would be to either lose something we already value or miss out on something that we really want.

​Secondly, the outcome is somewhat uncontrollable. Galeophobia, or a fear of sharks is compounded by the fact shark behaviour appears unpredictable, they are much faster swimmers than humans are…and it’s hard to see them coming. To assert control people with galeophobia are likely to avoid going in the water altogether (and for extreme sufferers this might extend to avoiding inland lakes and rivers even though there is no possible risk of sharks being present).

​Thirdly, the outcomes feel unavoidable. Arachnophobia is one of the most common fears because in our day to day lives spiders are so hard to avoid. You might argue that people with galeophobia can avoid their fear by avoiding swimming at the beach, but as soon as they go near a large body of water, even an inland lake with no possibility of sharks, their fear once again comes to the surface.

​At this point it is also worth defining the subtle difference between fear and anxiety. Although closely linked, one way of understanding the difference between the two is familiarity. Fear is a based on genuine, well understood threat whereas anxiety is a mostly unfounded feeling of concern. From this perspective a fear of heights, sharks and spiders can be seen as quite legitimate, on other hand, very few people are familiar enough or informed enough about artificial intelligence to be genuinely fearful. It is more likely that they are suffering from a bout of digital anxiety.

​Now back to our comparison between the fear of death and our fear (or anxiety) around technology.

​It is fair to say that both technology and death can create undesirable outcomes (though death perhaps more so) and in our current reality both technology and death are unavoidable. The real difference between the two is that we have a greater sense of control over death than we do over cyberterrorism, artificial intelligence and robots. This is not to say that we can cheat death over the long term but on a daily basis we have a fairly well tuned sense of how to avoid it happening prematurely (such as looking before we cross the road and not drinking paint stripper).

​But it’s not just at a societal level that these anxieties about technology are being experienced, they are just as likely to occur within organisations. Some of the fears identified in the survey can be directly linked to the workplace (robots replacing the workforce, trusting artificial intelligence to do work). In addition, there are also more immediate issues that people are dealing with such as how to use the new Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system or who might read what I write on Slack/Yammer/Microsoft Teams.

​It is perhaps unsurprising that in the current era of organisational digitisation (or digital transformation) has seen an escalation on technology related anxiety. The desire to roll out multiple technology solutions quickly means that people are being given less time and less support to build familiarity with the technology they are expected to use. This lack of familiarity means people are both less likely to see the opportunity that such systems offer but also, they are more likely to catastrophise the outcomes of getting it wrong. This in turn leads to them exerting what limited control they feel that they have over technology, they take every opportunity to avoid it. As a result, organisations are experiencing an increased sense of ‘push back’ on technology deployment.

​This anxiety around new technology is not new. We have most recently experienced concerns about WIFI frying our brains, prior to that it was the risks associated with sitting too close to the TV, before that it was concerns about telephones being the communication device of the devil (and this was prior to the inception of telemarketing) and earlier than that again was a belief that the speed of steam powered train travel would make our bodies explode.

​In each case people have eventually managed to overcome these anxieties and as a result take advantage of the opportunity that each of these technologies represented. Eventually our experience of artificial intelligence, robotics and CRM will be no different. The question is, are we willing to wait for this anxiety to dissipate naturally over time (in which case we forgo the short-term benefit that such technologies bring) or do we intervene to help people overcome these anxieties sooner?

​A successful intervention is fundamentally based on helping people building familiarity. To build familiarity we need to provide users a safe and supported environment in which to experiment and test out new technology, and if we want people to start actively experimenting we first need them to believe that doing so is worth their time. What this means is that ultimately, if we want people to overcome their anxieties and adopt new technology we first need to help them identify what’s in it for them, not necessarily what’s in it for us.

​Most technology decisions are so often made by a small handful of people for benefit of the organisation. This approach is based on the premise that employees have no choice as to what technology they use but this is not true at all. People always have a choice, they have a choice to avoid, a choice to subvert, or more drastically, they have a choice to leave.

​If we want our digital transformation programs to succeed, if we want people to adopt and use the technology solutions that are being deployed, if we want to build an innovative culture that helps us retain our best talent, then we will first need a rethink on how we engage with, understand and support our people to use the incredible technology that is now available to them.

This blog post has been syndicated to Medium. If you’d like to add comments or ideas, head over to this page.

https://www.simonwaller.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Simon-through-window.jpg400600Simonhttps://www.simonwaller.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/simonwaller-web-1-300x138.pngSimon2018-03-15 10:03:552018-03-20 11:26:25Why our fear of technology is greater than our fear of death

The power of giving people a choice lies in what their decision tells us. If we insist that people use a particular piece of software or work in a particular way, we may find out that there are better ways for things to be done.

The PC era of technology was defined by the standard operating system. Computers would be preinstalled with Microsoft Windows and Microsoft Office. People were largely expected to do their work with just a handful of solutions, Word, Excel, Powerpoint and Outlook. This used to make a lot of sense, firstly because there weren’t that many other options to choose from and secondly, end users mostly lacked the knowledge and skills to identify other options and use other options.

But we are now operating in a new era where much of the software we need is now web based and can be purchased on a subscription basis. There is now an incredible number of options that can be accessed cheaply and easily, and from any device we choose to use. But most organisations provide little or no opportunity for people to have a say in the technology they use.

Now we could pretend that people don’t have a choice. That, as employees being paid a salary, they should be expected to use whatever technology and tools they are given, but the truth is people always have a choice. The first, the smallest, and perhaps most common choice they have is to abstain, to actively find ways to avoid using the solution they’ve been given. The second, medium sized choice is to go and source an alternative (and in a world of web based software that you can purchase with a credit card this is not all that difficult). And although it seems a rather drastic response, the third possible choice is to resign. In fact research shows that when high performers don’t get the technology they need to do their best work they are twice as likely to leave the organisation.

Once we accept that people always have a choice, the next question is ‘how can structuring these choices help provide meaningful feedback to the business?’ Providing people a certain level of choice as to what technology they use (or even whether they use the technology or not) helps organisations understand whether the tools being provided are what people want and need. Clearly, if our people adopt and actively use the technology solutions they are provided then we are doing a pretty ace job. But each of the alternatives: abstinence, seeking alternatives and abandonment give insight into what might be wrong.

Abstinence suggests that either the espoused or actual value proposition for the end user doesn’t stack up. If someone is unwilling to try the solution at all, or tries it and then discards it soon afterwards, then we need to accept that for whatever reason, it doesn’t appear to be a good use of their time.

If someone is seeking alternatives then it reflects a belief that there are better, more useful or usable solutions available than the one that’s been provided….and if they are also unwilling to tell you about their proposed alternate it also implies that they don’t trust the IT department to work in their best interest.

Perhaps the most worrying of all is resignation or abandonment. We generally abandon something if it has no perceived value now, or in the future. The decision to resign implies that not only is the current technology inadequate but there is little hope that this will be addressed in the immediate future.

We are in an era of rapid digitisation. In many cases organisations are rolling out multiple large technology solutions that have the potential to provide incredible value to the organisation…if they are used effectively. On the other hand, if these solutions are not embraced or are not used effectively the benefits will go unrealised and all that the organisation will be left with is the cost.

People always have a choice and the success of our digital transformation projects ultimately rests on what people choose to do. Once we acknowledge this then clearly the best course of action is to help our people make better, more informed choices…whatever the outcome of those choices might be.

If you’re looking to start a digital transformation program for your organisation but having a hard time getting the ball rolling, head over to the Digital Champions Club to see how we can help you through the process.

This blog post has been syndicated to Medium. If you’d like to add comments or ideas, head over to this page.

https://www.simonwaller.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Stay-On-Trail_6x4.jpg400600Simonhttps://www.simonwaller.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/simonwaller-web-1-300x138.pngSimon2018-02-16 14:57:012018-09-10 13:13:49The power of choice

Back in around 2007, I spent a few a few years working for Rio Tinto. It was my first and only proper corporate job…and it came with a proper corporate IT team. When I started there the IT team was located just a couple of floors below me, but even then I only remember meeting one member of the IT team face to face. His name was George. Unlike the rest of the IT team that stayed at their desks, George use to walk each of 20 odd floors of Rio Tinto employees every couple of weeks. He would drop by each desk, identifying problems people were having, and showing them simple tips and tricks with their laptop or Blackberry (it was 2007 after all).

Photo by Alex Kotliarskyi on Unsplash

…That was until the Helpdesk function got outsourced to India and then I never saw George again, or anyone else from IT for that matter. Getting IT issues fixed ended up being a lot harder and often it was just seemed easier to leave them broken.

Many would find this a rather typical experience of corporate IT. The commoditisation of IT services and the pursuit of lower costs have seen many IT functions either outsourced or rationalised out of existence. But the impact of this is much bigger than the pain and frustration of end users not being able to get simple computer issues fixed. The big cost is in the unrealised potential of new technology solutions to be applied within an organisation.

There is little doubt that some of the biggest opportunities in modern business are being driven by innovations in technology. Yet if the people who understand the technology aren’t (or can’t) effectively engaging with people in the operational side of the organisation, many of these opportunities will never be identified, investigated, or ultimately implemented.

This physical separation between people in IT and operations is just a facet of the IT-Operational Divide. In addition to the physical divide, there is often also a language divide (people in IT and operations use different words, abbreviations and terms), a role divide (people in IT and operations work in fundamentally different ways and don’t understand how or why that is the case) and potentially even a respect divide (IT professionals are often seen as a roadblock and struggle to get the respect of their peers).

As long as this continues, the impact on the bottom line has got little to do with what the cost of the IT function and a lot to do with the improvement opportunities that are never identified.

To proactively realise these opportunities, we ultimately need to overcome the IT-Operational divide…and somewhat ironically the best way to overcome the divide would be to get IT and operational people working together to realise some of these opportunities. But left to their own devices this is unlikely to occur (like mixing oil and water this may initially require a bit of shaking, or for the nerds out there the addition of an emulsifier). Instead organisations need to provide a structured ‘learn by doing’ approach that facilitates direct engagement and breaks down the physical, language, role, and respect barriers that are currently holding the organisation back.

This blog post has been syndicated to Medium. If you’d like to add comments or ideas, head over to this page.

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Simon Waller is a author, speaker and trainer helping organisations get more out of their technology. He is also the founder of the Digital Champions Club, a program that develops internal digital experts who can identify, investigate, and implement the technology projects that matter.

https://www.simonwaller.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/The-Divide_6x4.jpg400600Simonhttps://www.simonwaller.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/simonwaller-web-1-300x138.pngSimon2018-01-23 11:47:272018-03-20 11:27:20The divide between IT and...well, everyone else in your business